These People Were Truly Ruthless

Second Layer entrance.

A party of adventurers who had just entered saw Mark and his group running toward them in a sorry state. Their silver-white armor was battered and torn, Mark's left arm hung limply at his side, and his blond hair clung to his sweat-drenched face. None of his usual lofty bearing remained.

"Should we make a move?"

The assassin in the adventuring party toyed with a dagger, his eyes sweeping over the throats of Mark and the others. His meaning could not have been clearer.

In the Dungeon, danger did not only come from monsters.

To adventurers, the severely wounded Mark and his group were also a huge fortune. The full plate armor forged from fine steel, along with Mark's clearly superior knight armor, was practically a juicy piece of meat delivered right to the mouths of an ordinary adventuring party.

And this was the Dungeon. As long as they kept things clean, who would know they had done it?

"Let's find out what happened first," the party leader said in a low voice.

Mark and the others were not nobodies. As the personal knights of Margery Town's lord, every adventurer in town knew them. Mark himself was a Formal Professional, and he had several Knight Apprentices with him.

Even with serious injuries, taking them down would not be easy.

Of greater concern was what Mark and his group had encountered to end up in such a state. They had been the first group to enter the Dungeon's second layer... Could they have already found the entrance to the Third Layer?

Or had they encountered some treasure?

With only a glance exchanged, the adventurers spread out and neatly blocked the exit leading back to the first layer, completely cutting off Mark's path back.

"What are you people trying to do?"

The badly injured Mark stopped with the three remaining knights. His gaze locked onto the adventurers blocking his way, fury in his eyes like a volcano about to erupt. He had just fought to buy time to escape.

Ignoring the backlash, Mark had forcibly unleashed greater strength with a berserk potion to temporarily hold back the Large Steel Slime charging at them. Then he had fled upward with the three surviving members of his knight squad.

Along the way, they had also encountered two Death Iron Skeletons. Mark had traded injury for life and forcefully killed one in an instant, then thrown his greatsword to knock back the other Death Iron Skeleton before finally escaping here.

Not only was Mark's left hand ruined, but the more serious problem was that the backlash from the berserk potion had erupted. At this moment, less than a tenth of his battle aura remained, and his entire body felt weak and powerless.

"Damn commoners, move aside!" Mark took several steps forward, glaring aggressively at the adventurers before him. "If you don't move, I'll kill you all myself!"

Mark could not show even the slightest weakness now. He had to be even fiercer, or these adventurers would pounce on him like hyenas that had smelled blood. Having encountered countless adventurers, Mark understood these so-called adventurers very well.

It was a profession with remarkably high highs and low lows. The greatest adventurers slew dragons, exterminated evil gods, and left behind countless legends. As for the lowest of them, aside from newcomers doing odd jobs like finding cats and walking dogs, many adventurers also moonlighted as bandits, thugs, thieves, and gang enforcers.

Behind him, the other three members of the knight squad drew their weapons the moment their captain spoke, ready to fight. They only needed Mark's command to charge forward and battle the adventurers.

"Calm down, Sir Mark. I merely saw that you were injured and wanted to offer a little help."

The ordinary-looking adventurer leader examined Mark and the three knights. Just as the atmosphere between both sides grew increasingly tense, he suddenly raised his hands to show that he meant no harm and smiled faintly.

At the same time, another adventurer took out a healing potion and threw it toward Mark.

"No need." Mark did not even glance at the healing potion flying past him. He said coldly, "Move aside immediately, or else..."

Fire-attributed battle aura erupted, and the temperature around them rapidly rose. Under the firelight, Mark's face grew increasingly ferocious, like a beast ready to tear apart its prey at any moment.

"Let them through."

After a brief silence, the adventurer leader gestured for his companions to clear the way. But as Mark passed him, he asked, "Captain Mark, what did you encounter?"

"A treasure chest, a Mana Spring, and a Large Mutant Steel Slime."

Mark led the three knights away without looking back. Only after passing through the spiral passage and returning to the first layer did his expression collapse. His body was so weak that he could barely stand. Fortunately, the knights beside him reacted quickly and caught him before he fell.

"Leave the Dungeon at top speed and rendezvous with the other three teams." After giving that final order, Mark could no longer hold on and fainted.

"Captain, why didn't we make a move just now?"

The thief who had thrown the healing potion at Mark earlier stepped forward, picked it up from the ground, and tilted his head at his captain. He had no idea when his captain had become such a good person.

"That guy wasn't easy to deal with." The ordinary-looking man shook his head and continued, "A beast's last struggle before death is often the most dangerous. Besides, we didn't come away empty-handed."

What Mark had said before leaving was the main reason the adventurer leader had been willing to let them go. A treasure chest and a Mana Spring were already worth more than Mark and his four companions. As for a mere Large Steel Slime, he did not care about it at all.

"Fine. You're the captain, after all." The thief nodded regretfully and put the healing potion back into his clothes.

That guy had been a little too cautious, completely unlike those idiot nobles inside the kingdom. The healing potion he had thrown out was real, but its bottle had been coated with a colorless, odorless substance. Touching it alone was harmless.

But once it was combined with something else, it would instantly become a deadly poison.

"Stop talking. Follow the traces they left behind and take the treasure chest and Mana Spring."

"Yes, Captain!"

The other adventurers licked their lips, greed flashing in their eyes. After learning that a Dungeon had appeared in Margery, they had abandoned their mission and rushed back overnight just to make a fortune.

Led by the thief, they followed the traces Mark and the others had left while fleeing and hurried toward the Mana Spring.

"These people were truly ruthless."

Lucifer, who had been watching everything unfold, could not help sighing. Having lived in a peaceful era before transmigrating, where had he ever seen a scene like this?

Still, Lucifer had to admit that the adventurers and noble knights capable of reaching the second layer in such a short time were neither fools nor idiots. They might be evil, shameless, despicable, and utterly without limits, but they were not stupid.

Lucifer decided to learn well from these adventurers and noble knights, striving to make the Dungeon even more sinister, dangerous, and without limits. Only then could it better stop adventurers from entering the Dungeon.